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Senate Co-Sponsorship Memoranda
Senate of Pennsylvania
Session of 2021 - 2022
Regular Session
MEMORANDUM
| Posted: | June 8, 2021 10:24 AM |
|---|---|
| From: | Senator Ryan P. Aument |
| To: | All Senate members |
| Subject: | Open Campus Expansion |
| In the near future, I plan to introduce legislation that would broaden the Commonwealth’s Open Campus Initiative to include charter schools, regional charter schools, and cyber charter schools. Currently, the Open Campus Initiative, as written within the Public School Code, permits school districts to enter into collaborative partnerships, which affords a student from one participating district to attend classes at the other school district and receive credit for that course. The Commonwealth’s Open Campus Initiative is a valuable resource for students because it gives them opportunities that their current school district may not be equipped to offer, such as high-level language courses, AP credit courses, and specialized career and vocational courses. In particular, I have found that some school districts have a difficult time acquiring teachers with specialized degrees to administer a variety of AP courses or simply do not have enough student demand to offer certain elective courses, such as Japanese or computer coding classes. As a result of school districts not having these courses readily available for their students, there have been numerous examples of students deciding to attend a school outside of their district or opt to attend a charter school, regional charter school, or cyber charter school where those courses are offered. Specifically, my legislation would amend Article 15-G of the Public School Code to include charter schools, regional charter schools, and cyber charter schools as a school entity permitted to participate within the Open Campus Initiative. By authorizing charter schools, regional charter schools, and cyber charter schools to participate, school districts would have the ability to partner with a charter/cyber charter schools to offer courses and curricula that they may not currently offer without the need for students to enroll in the charter/cyber charter school. The goal would be to allow school districts and their students to access this content through their school districts at no cost; the only time a cost would be incurred is if participating schools choose to have a charter/cyber charter teacher oversee and manage the course. In addition, the legislation is voluntary and school districts are not required to develop these collaborative partnerships with a charter school, regional charter school, or cyber charter school. Rather, it would simply provide school districts the option to integrate into their own curriculum courses and materials from local education agencies (LEAs) that are currently not eligible to participate in the Open Campus Initiative. More importantly, as it relates to COVID-19, we have seen the tremendous amount of learning loss and the challenges some school districts are having with addressing this issue. My legislation would help accelerate addressing some of that learning loss because school districts will have an additional tool in their toolbox. Please join me in sponsoring this proposal to increase student access to educational opportunities. |
Introduced as SB786